


Respect

by awtuscany



Series: Kingdom Hearts and Found Families [4]
Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Character Study?, Hope, No Dialogue, Short One Shot, vanitias has ventus's memories of their time as a Dandelion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-27
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-20 12:13:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18992443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/awtuscany/pseuds/awtuscany
Summary: There are very few people Vanitas has actual respect for. She's one of them.(Spoilers for later chapters of Those We Masters Have Wronged but they are only very light spoilers.)





	Respect

There are few people on the side of light Vanitas gives much more than a passing thought about. Sora and Ventus don’t count. They are his brothers. Three beings so connected that they could not exist without each other. Vanitas is the shadow that Sora and Ventus cast with their bright and blinding light. Going even further than just thinking about, there’s only one person who has ever fought on the side of the light that Vanitas feels any respect for. 

Master Ava.

The foreteller should be long dead and yet there she is, guiding and protecting Sora just as she did for Ventus all those years ago. There’s no one else on the side of light Vanitas expects anything of. All of those guardians of light are weak fools. Master Ava is the exception that proves the rule as far as Vanitas is concerned. Her strength has never come from her faith in the light or her friends. It has always come from her. She’s strong without the need for bonds or faith. She’s strong from experience, age, wisdom, and betrayal. She was strong back then and she’s even stronger now. 

She cuts down a heartless that comes too close to Sora with a fire in her eyes. Vanitas can’t help respect that fire. She moves with grace, unleashing powerful magic and melee combos with quick and precise movements. She twists and rolls out of the way of enemies before beautifully countering their attacks with little effort. Ventus, even without his memories, tried very hard to imitate Master Ava’s style. She was the master that trained him before any of the others. Before Xehanort, before Eraqus, before Aqua, there was only Master Ava and her skill. Her light. Her hope. 

That was one thing Ava did have an abundance of, hope. She radiates it even now, bitter and jaded as she’s become. She still hopes that she can save Sora, still hopes she can find the dandelions, still hopes she can show the other foretellers the error of their ways. She burns with light because she hopes so fiercely that there’s no room for darkness in her. Nothing can destroy the seeds of hope she plants in others. She brings light and hope. It’s why she’s a dangerous opponent to go against. It’s why Vanitas doesn’t approach her or the Master of Masters. 

Her hope is too much. She would welcome him with open arms because she would hope that he could fight for something other than darkness. She would hope that he could be something other than darkness. She wouldn’t push him to it. She would just hope for it. That would plant the seed of hope in him too. He likes being darkness. He doesn’t need a false hope of finding the light in himself. He was born from the darkness in Ventus’s heart. He feeds off the negative emotions of the worlds. He was strengthened by the darkness in Sora’s heart. He has no need for light.

But Ava would still hope that he could find some light, or at the very least use his darkness to protect the light. She would hope and he would fall for that false hope. That he could be something more than a shadow to his bright brothers. That’s a hope he doesn’t allow himself. That’s the hope Master Ava would plant in him.

Vanitas respects Master Ava. She has a way of getting to others. Convincing them to hope as well. That power… That’s the most dangerous power of all. That’s why she’s a dangerous enemy. More than her skill with illusions, more than her powerful healing, more than her skill with the keyblade and magic. Her ability to hope and make others hope as well. That is her most dangerous skill and that’s why Vanitas does not want to make himself her enemy. Hope is a powerful emotion. One he can’t use. Vanitas wants nothing to do with it. But he can’t stop watching her. Master Ava. The one person he respects. 


End file.
